Originally developed with Emote, game now comes under full control of Just Cause dev

Just Cause developer Avalanche Studios has secured the full intellectual property rights to online game The Hunter.

The game was originally a joint project with the UK's Emote Games, which owned publishing rights to the title built on Avalanche's own game engine.

"We are very happy that the discussions were concluded in our favor," commented Linus Blomberg, founder and CTO of Avalanche Studios. "The game has unfortunately suffered from the extremely tough business climate during 2009."

"We are fully committed to the development of The Hunter and to the continued investment in the IP. We will reach out to the community as soon as possible as we are transferring the operations and development of the service to our premises."

Avalanche has said that it hopes to continue developing the game with minimal disruption to users, with updates and brand new content after a short amount of downtime.

"The Hunter presents us with very exciting opportunities, and we have high ambitions for this game," added Christofer Sundberg, creative director of Avalanche.

"Having control over all aspects of the service puts us in a good position to cooperate closely with the community and improve the experience even further."

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